The JV Club #26: Grey DeLisle

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The 26th episode of The JV Club finds Janet delighting in the glorious Grey DeLisle with a conversation about red lipstick, giant hair bows, oversharing with your son, and having a grandmother whose uncommon beauty caused car accidents. Disclaimer: the ladies essentially forget to make references to Azula and Korra. Whoops!

Super-late to this, but wanted to say this was a great interview with a fascinating-sounding person. I’d heard Grey before on Rob Paulsen’s Talking Toons podcast, which now that I think seems more like JVClub than any other I’ve heard, probably because both find experiences that can be helpful to listeners making choices in their lives (him more careerwise, JV more personal). Would be interesting if there are more crossovers going forward (hey, or backward: time to listen to both on Lorraine Newman). Course the best would be JV on Talking Toons.

Listening again…I, too, worry about the segregation seeming like a fix when, for example, often it’s simply the teaching of math is bad for most students of all descriptions…assuming the differences between genders, for example, exceed the differences among members of each gender seems to me very unproven. (Of course, I went to a school in junior high that attempted an “open” classroom model that just had incomplete walls between classrooms…which meant that there was constant bleedthrough of noise from the neighboring otherwise utterly conventional classrooms…). Teachers with enough support and experience to be able to tailor their work with kids to what the kids’ needs are seems to me more the way to go than default segregation (and the odd distortions that introduces, at times, at least)…

Greatly enjoyed this episode. I’ve had a crush on at least one of the many characters Grey has voiced (recently, even). I heard her on Rob Paulsen’s podcast, now here. I could relate to her on some deep levels which just makes her that much more endearing to me. I’m a huge fan. Thanks to both Janet and Grey for such a good talk.

Guys! Love the comments! Except you, Grey. You, not so much. EEEEEE! 😉
Scott, thank you so much for posting this story! I’m going to mention it in next week’s intro so hopefully people will come here to read it!
Feel free to post it on the JV Club Facebook Page as well!

The German dad has become a role model not only for his son, but for parents around the world, after a photograph of the pair holding hands in red skirts spread across the internet.
“Yes, I’m one of those dads, that tries to raise their children equal,” he explained in an essay published alongside the photo in Emma, a German feminist magazine.

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Pickert never minded that his son liked dressing in little girl’s clothes, but when his family moved from West Berlin to a small southern town in Germany, he learned that other people did. In fact, it became a “town wide issue,” according to Pickert, whose essay was translated by Tumblr user steegeschnoeber.

A new school didn’t make life any easier for his young son. Shortly after his first day, he stopped reveling in his own tastes and Pickert worried about the damage it could wreak on his self-confidence.
“I didn’t want to talk my son into not wearing dresses and skirts,” Pickert explained. “He didn’t make friends doing that in Berlin… so after a lot of contemplation I had only one option left: To broaden my shoulders for my little buddy and dress in a skirt myself.”

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That’s where the red skirt came in, a pants-free option Pickert himself would sometimes take back in Berlin, without getting even a second glance. He’d stopped wearing skirts when they moved to their small village, knowing a man in women’s clothes could cause rubbernecking accidents at the very least. But when his son asked his father to wear a skirt again, he decided to step up to the challenge.
For that he’s been hailed as “Father of the Year” by Gawker, and praised in parenting blogs around the web for his progressive approach to nipping self-esteem issues in bud.

Hand in hand, the Pickerts paraded their custom together around their small village, and soon the shame died away. His son became emboldened again, even giddy at the reactions his father got from slack-jawed strangers. Being different, he found, wasn’t so scary after all, especially when Dad’s got your back.

After Pickert’s son learned that lesson, he began passing the wisdom on to his classmates. If he’s teased now, he tells them: “You don’t dare to wear skirts and dresses because your dads don’t dare to either.”

For parents and educators, bullying is a critical issue with no clear-cut prevention method. How do you protect a child from the cruelty of others and how can a bullied child walk away without feeling defensive or ashamed? Pickert’s plan comes down to more than just a dad in a skirt. It’s an approach that translates across borders, both physical and theoretical: If a child is attacked for being different, don’t leave them hanging. Be different with them.